10-Point
Plan to Rebuild the US after Bush's Destruction: Redux and Explanation

In my previous
Rec Report, entitled, "10-Point
Plan for Rebuilding the United States after Bush's Destruction"
(for which I have received much flak and a fair number of death threats
from militant right-wingers--which in itself more than vindicates much
of what I wrote), I made the following two points that seem to have roused
the most ire from rabid Republicans, some of whom suggested, not unsurprisingly,
that my remarks constitute a contradiction.

9. Consider the
possibility that the Republican ideology contravenes the Constitution
because its policies and beliefs endanger the well-being of the people.
Consider making the Republican Party illegal.

10. Start a party
that opposes the Democratic Party from the left of the Democratic Party
and makes the Republican Party a detestable relic of the past akin to
the slave-holding Confederates.

The first of these
points has been the source of no inconsiderable anger and gnashing of
teeth amongst our 'friends' in the Republican Party. Just how can I claim
that the ideology of the Republican Party contravenes the Constitution?
Then, how can I go on, in an apparent contradiction, to suggest that the
Republican Party be made illegal? Doesn't that restrict the First Amendment
rights of some citizens, especially those who would espouse Republican
views?

My answer is this;
As Herbert Marcuse argued brilliantly in his critique
of "Repressive Tolerance" in Critique of Pure Tolerance,
the "liberal" (in the older, classical sense of liberalism,
under which contemporary conservative political parties also fall), bourgeois
notion of pure tolerance is impossible. Pure tolerance allows for the
tolerance of some views that simply stand in total contradiction of the
most immediate rights of others-in particular, their right to exist. Given
that some speech is motivated by and has been responsible for the deaths
of others for no apparent reason other than the wills of those who would
kill these others, some ideologies cannot be tolerated. ("Speech,"
I argue, should not be differentiated from "action." "Speech,"
whether written or spoken, is a physical act that causes molecules to
move. To speak is to act.) The beliefs of Nazis that Jews are vermin and
do not deserve to exist is a belief that, if expressed, can lead to the
deaths of Jews, as in Nazi Germany. Similarly, the speech of the KKK can
and has led to the deaths and torture of Blacks in America, and should
not be allowed. To allow the putative "right" of some to express
such views that result in the annihilation of others, is a contradiction
in itself. As such, such "rights" are false rights.

But I seem to be
implying that the Republican Party should be likened to the Nazis and
the KKK. This is tiring, isn't it? The comparison is old-hat and overwrought
and not one that I want to make. I would liken them not along any other
lines than that all three are dangerous to the survival of numerous peoples.
Other than that, they are no more alike each other than fundamentalist
Christianity and fundamentalist Islam are alike.

The Republican
Party avows and holds positions that are anathema to the lives of millions,
if not billions. The Republican Party, officially or unofficially, declaims
the reality of Global Warming. The Republican Party disavows the science
of Global Warming because its corporate sponsors in the oil and automotive
industries are powerful forces within the party. These latter hire apologists
to produce counter-, junk science to stand in opposition to credible science-to
the detriment of our species' survival. They are bent on denial at all
costs and must be removed from power, because their power imperils human
life on the planet.

Secondly, the Republican
Party, at least in its current neoconservative configuration, is hell-bent
on War. The basic principle seems to be to incite whatever ideological
opposition there is against the US into militaristic confrontation. Such
an approach is anathema to the interests not only of the US citizens,
but of the world's population. The situation in Iraq is a prime example,
but the current confrontational mode with Iran is also apiece with this
posture. Rather than "fighting terrorism," the Republican Party
is mass-producing it, as numerous studies have made clear. Rather than
negotiation with those who differ with them ideologically and politically,
they try to stir them into taking some action that will then justify a
military attack. The Republican Party is doing more for terrorism than
all of the Al Qaida and other radical Islamic propaganda combined. One
may speculate on whether or not the Republican Party, tied so intimately
in economic collusion with the military industrial complex, actually wants
permanent, military-promoting war at all costs, or not. Regardless, that
appears to be the effect.

As for other points
in the 10-point plan, as some have pointed out, they couldn't be implemented
simply by an election or even impeachment. This list was always only
more of a 'wish list' than a list of real imminent possibilities.
But I ask, wouldn't the world be a lot better off with Bush, Cheney and
his major administration contributors out of office? Would it be better
with Bush and Cheney utterly discredited by serving prison time? Their
jail time would help because it would discredit future fanatics of their
kind from gaining ascendancy in American politics, ever again.

Of course, we couldn't
just revoke the judicial appointments of Bush-but the question is, shouldn't
we? After all, Bush was never elected-not the first
time and not the
second. And, his judicial appointments have the potential for setting
back the civil and social rights of millions of Americans, all for the
ideological play and religious fervor of a few. The real fact of the matter
is that control of reproduction belongs with those whose bodies will be
responsible for reproduction. And, talking about contradictions! Here's
a party that, without apology or an apparent second thought, would kill
tens of thousands of innocent walking-and-talking (brown-skinned) children
and adults, all the while claiming to be "pro-life." The only
life they seem to acknowledge is the embryonic life of white people-the
status of which is surely less certain than that of living and breathing
full-fledged individuals of the human race, whom they kill all the time.